BP Unfiltered

In Billy Wilder's classic The Lost Weekend, Ray Milland is always making plans and promises to his girlfriend, his brother, the B-girl at his favorite bar, even his bartender, but he always has one more thing to do before he can follow through: take another drink--or ten. As you might have guessed, Milland's character was an irredeemable alcoholic. At BP, we always have to do one more thing as well, because we are irredeemable perfectionists. In this case, the one more thing is an effort to make our projected Depth Charts and Player Forecast Manager as accurate, bug-free, and innocent as a newborn babe. We're not quite there yet; having changed a great deal behind the scenes, we need a little more time to check through and make sure everything and everyone is where they are supposed to be--it wouldn't do to have Wee Willie Keeler popping up and trying to claim Nick Markakis's playing time. Although, you never know, Orioles fans--he might be an upgrade.

We hope to release both products to beta testers today and have a full roll-out on Wednesday. We appreciate your patience as we get the DC and PFM up to our standards, and yours.

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Steven Goldman is an author of Baseball Prospectus. Click here to see Steven's other articles.
You can contact Steven by clicking here

Surely you didn't get to 6am on the day of the previously announced rollout and then make the decision to delay it? Could you have perhaps given us a bit more heads up? (I have told many a fantasy league owner over the weekend that I'd respond to their trade offers ... on Monday when my PFM-reliant spreadsheet is up & running.)

Sorta what dREaDS Fan said. Probably best to give us a schedule of inputs and tell us where you are regarding that, rather than even half-promising that you'll get to the end result by such-and-such a time.

This reminds me of the classic job interview question- "So, tell me what is your greatest weakness?" Everyone always answers some version of I care too much or I'm too much of a perfectionist or I work too hard.

I love the products when they work, but I wish I could work in a profession where you can give yourself a deadline, make it public, then give yourself an extension and the response is largely "thanks for the heads up."

I used to spend most of my work days mapping landfills, and could use the same argument. Now I'm the airport guy at the company, collecting vertical obstructions for airports around the country, so that the pilot knows what to not run into. At least, compared to the air traffic controller, I can take extra time to get it right.

Well said. The next time I postpone something on the very day I had promised it, I am going to avoid using the words "apologize" and "sorry" -- opting instead for "irredeemable perfectionist." I might throw in a few really obscure, off-topic references just to add to the smokescreen effect.

Presumably, you've been working on this for 10 months now. To let it get down to the last day like this is just poor planning. There have been major missed deadlines for each of the past five years. To continue the [bizarre] alcoholism parallel that Goldman leads with...the first step to fixing a problem is admitting you have it. The "problem" in this case is not an individual error or technical issue; it is a poor process for planning, managing, and controlling quality.

Go ahead an minus this. Call me an apologist or whathaveyou. Go ahead, I can take it. The fact is, I've been (nicely) asking for the PECOTA and PFM for the past couple of weeks. Nobody "promised" you, me, or any other subscriber that everything would be up and running today. Not ten months ago, and not ten days ago. A week ago, they issued the PECOTA spreadsheet, and Colin told us that "the plan" was to have it out today. No promises, just letting us know "the plan."

I don't know you and certainly haven't called you anything. I am pointing out the long-standing pattern of missed deadlines/promises/indications/randomly-generated-dates that has plagued BP for years now. I would love to think they have acknowledged and fixed the core problem. I have yet to see an acknowledgement, and if this particular instance is any indication, the issues remain to be fixed.

"Winning" would include: acknowledging the causes of issues in the past, detailing what has been done to fix them, and then delivering products on time.

First time PECOTA user. Looking at the 2011 spreadsheet, why are the projections so low this year - no pitcher with over 15 wins, only 1 or 2 hitters with over 110 rbi, etc? Is that normal, are they still developing, or what's up?

BPro is lucky to have such fiercely loyal fan boys, who not only stand by, but defend them against the paying customer who calls them out when they miss deadlines.

Without that loyalty they might be forced to respond to economic intensives to make deadlines, or else risk giving away a lot of product for free and/or have customers switch to one of the other sites with a cheaper product that's available earlier and preforms better against Marcel.

Just to clarify, I am not as annoyed with BPro missing the deadline as I am with those of you flaming the people who are annoyed.

Brian, Oliver was available Dec. 20th (at half the price), Last Player Picked (free) had CAIRO up in Jan. and Marcel up Feb. 3rd. I think it's fair to start getting antsy when every other forecast tool has had there stuff out for weeks, months...

Many subscribers have to declare keepers or respond to trades around this time of year and they have strict deadlines... the kind that can't be pushed back... so it baffles me when paying customers get mad that things are delayed that they are met with smarmy comments and their posts get negative feedback from the BP Defenders.

It's not the two days that even matters. It's the blatant spinning of this as some sort of evidence of BP's commitment to excellence that leaves a bad taste. I don't think even Microsoft would dare use "Irredeemable Perfectionists" as the title of what amounts to a bug report and release delay.

I don't feel flamed. I am not insulin dependent. I am not an alcoholic, though I understand that perfectionism can have negative impact ultimately.

As I noted at the start of my comment above, I love the product when it works. But perhaps the "real journalists" would take you more seriously if you actually HAD to meet deadlines. My recollection (I don't actually care enough to go back and pull the reference) is that when the PECOTA spreadsheets came out, the PFM release was set for 2/14 with the implication that it might come sooner. My assumption is the server upgrades over the weekend and other "issues" got in the way. I'd be happier if I could be using the PFM instead of whining about not having it, which I suspect we all have in common.

OK, numbers don't make sense yet($26 total budget and PFM suggests I bid $24+ for Hanley Ramirez), but there a really like:
The 'i' information dots are great - thank you
The multiple team entry option on the saved page is also a plus.